WHY THE STORKS MIGRATE; AN ANALYSIS OF THE CUBAN EXODUS.
By Ebenezer Ramírez, Cuba Free Press.

Havana.- I have always been motivated to write about migrations. Birds
migrate; Cubans emigrate. Why the exodus? To what is it due? The Cuban
reality sets itself apart. The emigrant is a person who is excluded inside
his country of origin. Today's Cuban emigrates for various reasons:

* Because of spiritual deficiencies: Lack of freedom, of prospects, of
possibilities to realize oneself as a person, out of frustration, anguish.

*Because of material scarcities: nutrition, work, health, education.

Well now, what does the emigrant take away from Cuba?

* The breaking off of family ties, work, social and cultural relationships.

* The responsibility of satisfying the expectations of the family and the
social division that remains behind in his country.

Formerly, at the beginning of the exodus, the only expectations of
the family that remained behind and expected it could not leave, was that
those who had succeeded in reaching exile would be happy. It was enough to
know that they were free and happy, fulfilling all the hopes that had been
placed in them, being the best part of the best for them and the society
that welcomed them.

Many left believing that they would return right away. After 1961 it was
discovered that the time for returning was indefinite.

As time passed and the situations in Cuba became more desperate, the
expectations of those who stayed behind changed. Because in reality, they
also wanted to emigrate.

But why the desire to leave the country of their birth? If everything is
going well in Cuba and everyone is so happy and there are doctors and
medicines, schools in abundance, if there is freedom, if there is equality,
why do Cubans emigrate, primarily toward the United States of America?

The reasons set forth above explain everything. When justice is a
corset that tightens until there is no oxygen, freedom is conditioned on
what others have already marked out as the standard for being free, and the
dignity of the person is snatched away.

When the Cuban is exploited, excluded, humiliated, told what he can
eat, wear or do, when he is forced to devalue other cultures for the simple
fact of valuing the native culture as the only one and the system as the
best, it leads to the exodus.

The Gospel according to Matthew tells us the dramatic experience of a forced
emigration and Luke's Gospel recounts the birth of Jesus away from the city
of his parents because "There was no place for them at the inn." Lk. 2:7.

When a Cuban emigrates, be it for reunification with a part of the family or
for political grounds, and uses any means to achieve it, it sends a message.
If the emigration is an exodus, the message is double. And it sends out a
cry, a cry that he or she no longer can put up with the lack of solidarity
and the injustice suffered due to the antagonism of a few over the rest, the
ambition, power, psychological repression and selfishness which keeps Cuba
morally and economically impoverished.

Then there's the lack of values, ethics and morals, the despotism, the
forces which have marked off class, ideological and political differences.

The storks are the sign of the times.

The displacement of Cubans in the direction of other lands leaves indelible
imprints. Many search more than 90 miles away for the solution to their
problems. The claim to life, in addition to notions such as nation,
boundaries, rights and politics, is the full emancipation of the human
being.

But what remains for those who cannot spread their wings and raising them up
as wings of eagles, fly through the clouds toward a place of peace?

For them exclusion, differences, bitterness, dissatisfaction and loss of
expectations remain. Therefore to draw near to God, evangelizing is the only
way we have to continue the way.

Our mission is to build the people of God and make possible the brotherhood
that in the outside world does not exist. And so the phrase: Cuba for Christ
Now! Let it be more than a motto, a reality. Only in this way will the
emptiness that a life of frustrations leaves in the Cuban be filled.

The rebirth of the Cuban's Faith is why it makes sense. The desire to attend
churches. "Now is the acceptable time, not tomorrow."